


feels like cerulean flames swallowing my body when you talk to me

by knoxoursavior



Category: Banana Fish (Anime & Manga)
Genre: M/M, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-27
Updated: 2019-04-27
Packaged: 2020-02-07 08:10:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,038
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18616639
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/knoxoursavior/pseuds/knoxoursavior
Summary: Yut-lung seems to be convinced that he’s more than what he is.





	feels like cerulean flames swallowing my body when you talk to me

**Author's Note:**

> written for day 6 of bf rarepair week :~)

He isn’t enough.

As much as Blanca would like to be, he knows that he isn’t. Not soft enough, not gentle enough, not  _ good  _ enough. He’s had all semblance of love torn from his body, has been left bloody and broken, left to function as barely human for over a decade.

He feels, but barely. He lives, but barely. Oh, but he  _ survives, _ and he will continue to survive because it is all he has left in this awful, cruel world he just can’t seem to part with. Love is only a distant memory, but it’s a beautiful one, even dulled by his hazy recollections.

Yut-lung seems to be convinced that he’s more than what he is, though.

Blanca’s hands are too big, too clumsy with anything that isn’t a gun, too dirty to hold anyone but himself and his own crimson-stained skin, and yet Yut-lung always inserts himself into Blanca’s space and holds on until Blanca curls a hand around his nape and another on the curve of his spine. His skin is always warm against Blanca’s, a steady simmer instead of the burning furnace Blanca would have thought he’d be when they first met, when Yut-lung was angry and little else, when Blanca was just another murderer once again, and nothing else.

Blanca’s heart is too worn-out, too guarded, too weak to do anything but the bare minimum to keep him alive, dusty and crumbling as it is after being neglected for so many years, and yet it starts up with every kiss Yut-lung presses against his lips, flares and flutters in his chest, an excitable little thing, every time Yut-lung looks up at Blanca with those dark eyes of his, so different from Natasha’s and yet, somehow, so similar.

Blanca is too old for this, too jaded, too weary, and yet he’s happy that it’s him who Yut-lung chooses to love.

Him. Not anyone else. Not anyone better.

_ Him. _

Blanca wouldn’t say that he never entertained the possibility of it; after all, he did spend his first few years back in the Caribbean turning his head for every sign of long, black hair, every flash of pale skin, every glimpse of pink lips pressed into a thin smile. But still, he never expected Yut-lung to actually come, never dared to hope, never let himself get lost in fantasies of being saved by a beautiful boy with a heart so close to becoming like his.

Even until the moment Yut-lung pulled him down by his collar and coaxed him into a kiss, that first day of their new life. Even after days and weeks and months of Yut-lung staying with him, always there with a hand in Blanca’s own or an arm around Blanca’s waist or his head on Blanca’s chest. Always there with his eyes full of certainty and his lips curved into a smile so gentle, so patient, so beautiful that it still makes Blanca’s heart skip a beat even after seeing it so many times.

He isn’t the same boy he was in New York, full of anger and resentment. He’s been tried by the world, has fallen and gotten back up again. He was broken and battered, but he was strong enough to pick himself up and  _ live _ .

He’s more than Blanca deserves, and Blanca is less than he deserves, but here they are, gravitating towards each other like a moon to its planet. Yut-lung should be unreachable, a pretty little thing to admire from afar, but no, he reels Blanca in with his smiles and his light, bright even after everything he’s been through, genuine even though it’s supposedly Blanca who makes him so happy.

_ Supposedly. _ Yut-lung doesn’t like it when he says things like that. He’d huff and puff and pout. He’d say, “Do you doubt me?”

“No,” Blanca would reply, because Yut-lung has long since turned into steel, difficult to sway, certainty woven into every word, every action, every decision. Blanca just doesn’t understand why Yut-lung is so adamant on being with  _ him. _

Yut-lung would raise an eyebrow at him, and Blanca would pull Yut-lung close so he wouldn’t have to see whatever expression Blanca’s face has twisted into.

“I doubt myself,” Blanca would say. Maybe not his skills, and maybe not his experiences, but he doubts  _ himself.  _ His weak heart, his corrupt soul, his body, shaped into a weapon.

“Well, I don’t,” Yut-lung would say, and there would be no room for arguments in his tone. He’d pull away just enough so he could look Blanca in the eye. “I don’t doubt you. I wouldn’t be here if I did. Believe that, at least.”

And Blanca would swallow his protests, would buckle under the weight of Yut-lung’s words. He  _ wants _ to believe, is the thing. He wants to be happy. He wants to live and feel and  _ love,  _ and here, now, he thinks that maybe he can. Maybe with Yut-lung.

“Okay,” he’d say, and he’d mean it.

Things are different now.  _ He  _ is different. Different from how he was before he went back to America and got reminded that even people like him could still crawl their way out of the dark little corners they’ve backed themselves into and find light. Different from how he was before meeting Yut-lung. Different from how he was before Yut-lung surprised him and swept him off his feet with only a kiss and a promise.

He’s still afraid, of course. Still doesn’t think he could hold Yut-lung’s interest for long. Still doesn’t think he’s good enough. But, for some reason, Yut-lung is here with Blanca of his own volition, and that must mean  _ something. _

Besides, he knows enough about pain to realize that he shouldn’t be wasting what time he has with Yut-lung second-guessing himself.

He’ll let Yut-lung take his hand. He’ll let Yut-lung kiss his sins away until all that’s left of him is his heart, slowly recovering, slowly patching itself up as it feeds off Yut-lung’s light.

And one day—

One day, maybe he’ll be able to mean it enough to actually say it.

  
  
  
  


(  _ I love you,  _ he’d say.

Yut-lung would look up at him with those dark eyes of his, and he’d say,  _ I know. I love you too.  _ )


End file.
